Change

I learned two days ago that my job description will probably change in the next couple months. There are no words to explain my relief!
In the current job I direct a teaching clinic, teach, supervise, and act as liaison with community agencies that train our students, write the yearly academic report, and try to write articles on the side. ("What side?" you rightly ask...)

I knew something was wrong Friday when I came home from work, walked in the house past Sam and said menacingly, "Don't talk to me, don't touch me, leave me alone, don't follow me. I'm in a foul mood and can't even talk. I'm so angry I could explode." I've never said that before to anyone and it was alarming. I'd spent the entire day working on an article for publication. I finally got it revised (for the third time!) and sent off to the editor for a final review. In the process of working on that article I couldn't get to the clinical things or deal with the crises in the clinic that arose. It was truly more than I could keep up with.

My chairperson called me at home that afternoon to ask me a simple question about something and I started blowing smoke at her. "This job is structured in such a way as to be impossible. It's too much for one person--maybe even two. I've found so many messes to clean up since I've taken over for the last person--isn't anyone keeping track of these kinds of things, or were you saving them up for me?" I recalled saying that about another place I'd worked. Maybe it was just me. Maybe I'd also been hired into places with the expectation of saving the day. That was told me in clear terms when I arrived here. So I gave my chair an earful.
Then I learned that she wanted me to transition to full-time teaching and get out of the clinic. Nothing could make me happier. Then I can teach clinical courses in the clinic but not be responsible for the operation of it. Even better.

There are times when life goes in funny directions. I'm thinking that the direction I'll be moving toward will be an excellent one. More to come on that.

All I Need

My friend sounded very frightened on the phone today. "I don't tell anyone this but you," she began. "Because you're my friend..." I was silent, waiting to hear this privileged information.
"Are you there?"
"Yes. I'm just waiting."
"Oh. I don't tell anyone this. But I have no food. There is absolutely nothing in the fridge, nothing for the boys to eat. All my money is gone because I was sick."
"How are the boys eating then?"
"Oh, one of them has a credit card, or they go to their father's house to eat."

I have felt rather sorry for myself over the last couple weeks. I have made sure that my stepdaughters have the things they need for school, now that Sam and I are officially responsible for their care. And I have not been able to get the things I need for myself--not to mention, tucking money away in savings. Just yesterday, I was crying against Sam's chest. "I just want something to show for all that work getting a PhD. But..." I couldn't finish.
"Is it this house?" Sam knows that this house is a daily discouragement.
"No."
"Is it not having the clothes you want?"
"Yes. ...and other things."

All of this was lost in my consternation for my friend today. I had been contemplating sending money abroad for mission work, but here seemed to be a need in my own backyard. And the fact that my clothes are out of style is irrelevant when a person I know and love doesn't have food for herself and her family.

A couple hours later, as we put bag after bag of groceries away in her sparsely furnished cupboards, I realized just how much I do have. I'm healthy, happily married, employed, fulfilled (most of the time) at my job, respected in the community, and have the knowledge that I am loved on earth and in heaven. I have all the things that really matter.

On top of having all I need, I also have the pleasure--and it is a huge pleasure--to be able to give to someone else who has a need. As a child in a financially modest home (read, poor here), I despaired that I would ever have anything to give to anyone else. My mother baked bread and gave it away, along with vegetables from the garden. And that has always been my model for generosity. But this time I had the wherewithal to go beyond that, and it was a true gift.

I told this to Sam as I explained how I had just spent all that money. He is such a dear. "Now we know why God allowed us to put away that extra money in savings, don't we?" He paused and took a breath, looking kindly at me. "There are reasons for everything. We just can't always know why at the time. But look!" He threw out his arms for emphasis. "We know about this one."

We have all we need, and now someone else does, too. I am so blessed and so grateful.

Glory

This morning I went off to church alone, as Sam and Briana were both under the weather and still in their beds. The sanctuary was full of beautiful Christmas decorations and the Advent candles were up front on a table bedecked with gold and red fabric. The choir was listed to sing Christmas music and I realized with a start that this is the first week in December, so we'd be getting to sing carols.
The deacons asked us in our row to press together and make room for two. He held up his two fingers in a peace sign and pointed to the space next to me, as he beckoned someone from the back of the church to be seated. A very large man shoved his way into the pew and sat down. I leaned over to welcome him and he looked away. He was out of breath and clearly had not liked walking down the center aisle all the way to my -pew.
Oh well. He was in church and that was what mattered.
An old friend came to the microphone with his guitar and invited the congregation to sing "Angels We Have Heard on High." I love that song because of that long "Glo-ho-or-or-orrrrr-ee-uh" at the end. It's always been a challenge of mine to see if I can hold out the note all the way to the end of the phrase instead of gasping in the middle of the word (a pet peeve of mine).
As I started singing the second verse ("Shepherds, why this jubilee?") I heard a loud soprano voice rising over everyone else's singing. It had a bit of a hooty quality to it, but the woman was spot on pitch. I was having such a swell time singing myself, that it wasn't until the second "Glo-ho-or-or-orrrrr-ee-uh" that it dawned on me that the soprano voice belonged to none other than the man sitting next to me. As I glanced sideways at him I could see an acqaintance on the other side of him looking at him with an expression of wild surmise. He was enjoying himself, eyes closed, leaning back in his pew and this high voice coming out of his puckery, cherubic lips.
I almost choked.

As I came to the last chorus, I began thinking that it's only because Jesus came to this earth that we have something to be happy about. He has broken the power of evil and sin and death in the human race. Because of His life, death, and resurrection, all of us can live in hope. We know that this is not all there is.
The man next to me was singing like he realized this, too. His voice slid down about two octaves, and he and I finished out the song.

Glo-ho-or-or-orrrr-ee-uh!

Squished

"Squished," found at this interesting blog

I can't believe that it's been nearly a week that I've not been back to my blog. I've been pushing myself very hard since I have an article due on Friday, and have been working day and night to get all the revisions done. Oh, and I also have a book chapter to submit on Friday. So that's what I've been about. My free time has become squished and I am squashed under all of my responsibilities. It's a time when I wish I could be teaching instead of running a clinic, teaching courses, supervising students, making site visits, doing research, and writing.
Next week I can hang Christmas lights around the house, put up the Christmas tree and start making Christmas gifts that need to be done in one month (say it's not true!)
Don't go away! I'll be back Friday night (with great relief!)

Thanksgiving Reflection

Yesterday as I was baking my annual pumpkin cake, I heard a loud popping sound. Otis jumped and looked worriedly out the back window. I saw a wisp of smoke coming out of the neighbor's chimney and chuckled to myself about what he must have had in the fireplace to make that noise. A few minutes later I noticed another neighbor going around the house, knocking on all the windows and yelling, "Steve, are you there? ...is anyone home?" A small stream of smoke was now coming out of the back bedroom window. The vertical blinds over the sliding glass window had melted and were in a pile on the floor.
An hour and two broken windows later, the fire department and my neighbor were picking through the burnt items on the back bedroom floor by lantern light. Something had exploded in that room--his computer, I think. So today, Steve is thankful that he still has a house and that he just has smoke damage, not a total loss.
Snug in my own smoke free house this morning, snuggling Otis and inhaling the warm smells of good things in the oven, I am grateful for many, many things. May all of you have a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday, and bask in all that you are privileged to enjoy.

Incidentally, you might enjoy this cake. I can't make a crust to save my life, so a pumpkin pie is an ordeal in my book. But this cake is like a custard with a lovely crust below and above. It's from my friend, Martha and it has no calories:

Mix 1/2 cup melted butter and 1 egg with 1 package of dry yellow cake mix. Set aside 1 cup of this mixture. Press the rest into the bottom of a 9X13 glass baking dish.

Mix 1 large (29 oz.) can of pumpkin with 1 cup sugar, 2 eggs, 2/3 cup milk, and 3 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice. Add a dash of salt. Pour into baking dish over the cake mix crust.

Mix 1/4 cup sugar, 1 teaspoon of cinnamon and 1 cup of saved cake mix mixture. Crumble over top of cake. (optional: pour 1/4 cup melted butter over the top of the cake and swirl around--this really adds to calories and doesn't appreciably improve the cake, so I'm not sure why it's recommended).
Bake at 350 for 50-60 minutes, or until the cake doesn't jiggle in the middle when gently shaken. Serve warm with non-dairy topping or whipped cream.

This cake can be frozen or will store in your refrigerator for 2 weeks. Enjoy!

Old hands, new hope

From a most excellent blog with beautiful photography

Since I moved to this town five months ago, I've been making regular visits to see an elderly couple. Etta has had a stroke and doesn't get around well. She spends most of her time in a recliner chair in the den. Jack however, is a going concern. Every morning he drives 2 miles to pick up the young woman who cares for Etta, brings her to the house and then takes her back home at 11:00 a.m. Then at 8:00 p.m. he picks her up again, brings her back home, where she helps Etta get ready for bed. Jack then drives her back to her own home at 9:30.

Jack is 94 and Etta is 95. They have been married for 73 years.

When I met these folks, my heart went out to them. They have no children and have lived alone in their own home for all these years. They have a beautiful condo in a gated community, and their house is spotless and comfortably furnished. No one should have to live by themselves like that with no one related to them to help them. Being the bleeding heart I am, I was immediately concerned when I first visited them. What if Etta falls on her way to the bathroom? Jack couldn't pick her off the floor. What if Jack has a heart attack while he's driving, or plows into someone with his huge boat of a car? What will she do if Jack dies? I realized that there are lots of qualities they have that my parents had: they are affectionate and live as a team. One lives for the other.

One afternoon during a telephone chat with Jack, he told me that he was grateful they could still be together in their own home. He had the slightest edge of concern in his voice as he added, "It now takes Etta 15 minutes to get to the bathroom and back. But we have to look at all that we've been given over the length of our lives, not just now."

When I visit these folks, there is not one iota of self-pity or concern about themselves. Life is what it is. They are content. Etta called me the other day to tell me that she'd found an ad in the local university paper that she felt I needed to investigate.
"Here's what it says. [I could hear papers rustling in the background]. Are you ready to write it down?"
"Yup."
He-he..."It's one of those computer addresses: double-ya double-ya double-ya dot homeseeker dot com. Does that sound right?"
"I'll check it out."
"You never know Barbara, it might be just the ticket."
"That would be wonderful."

Later in our conversation I asked her if I could bring over Thanksgiving dinner to them.
"Oh, that's sweet of you, Barbara. Let me ask Jack."
She dropped the phone onto her bosom and yelled at the top of her lungs, "Jack! Barbara wants to bring us Thanksgiving dinner. You have everything, don't you?"
A muffled response from another room.
"Okay."
"Barbara, he has everything for dinner. We're going to have turkey breast, sweet potatoes, cranberry sauce, and string beans. Jack has everything to make a pumpkin pie. So I think we're all set. But thanks anyway!"

That dear old man is cooking their own dinner and is just as happy to do so. They are self-contained. What a miracle that is in itself. But that they can do all that they are able to do is a real testament to positive thinking, healthy living, a good relationship and faith in God. So I moved from my position of pity for them to gratitude for such examples. They don't need me as much as I need them.

I smiled as I hung up the phone. I have to figure out what I'll be cooking for our Thanksgiving dinner.

If music be the food of love, play on!

Found here

Some people seem oblivious to the sounds around them. Others thrive on chronic background music--loud, frenzied, not-listened to, pulsing music. Sam is such a person. He has ADD so having lots of auditory stimulation actually helps him focus. He gets calmer with music going full blast.

I was a single, silence-loving, book-loving, curmudgeon-introvert for 44 years. Sam's music makes me feel like I may lose control and start throwing things.

My father had a degree in music and taught band and choir in private high schools. He had a choir that made a recording of sacred choral music. We grew up hearing music--classical or sacred music--all the time. The worst musical noise we had was the cacophony of drums, bassoon, trombones, tubas, piano, french horn, bass clarinet, and lots of singing full tilt. But there was some predictability and pleasure to it. As children, it was exhilarating to find expression with my siblings with such gusto, although I recall mother blowing smoke more than once about the "confounded noise in this house!"

Sam bought a CD of two guitarist brothers last month after hearing them at an outside street concert. They sounded exotic and invigorating in the open air. But going full blast out of Sam's study, they sound like two manics on speed with ants in their pants. The volume, frenetic repetition, and lack of melody can run me right out of the house.
Oh, I like loud music. Beethoven's 1812 Overture, or Puccini's La Boheme at top levels make for a spiritual experience. I may need some extended silence to soak in the experience afterward, but these are musical numbers that one could conceivably walk away singing in one's heart. Not so with the sheer noise of the wild guitarist brothers.

Of course, not everyone likes my music, either. Sam says the relaxing music I play puts him to sleep, especially if he's driving. So we can only listen in the car to very upbeat chamber music--which I prefer over static-ridden talk shows or worse yet, station scanning (!).

Sunday morning, Stepdaughter #2 came to breakfast with her laptop and set it down next to her plate. It was playing some sort of nondescript whining, bellyaching, juvenile moaner-type singers. I gently pointed out that I had music playing already on the Bose in the corner: Bach motets. She winced, but turned off her computer and ate thoughtfully. I was so grateful to continue breakfast in peace.

My cousin used to have a fit about hearing Bach: all those bewildering chord progressions. While I felt myself ascending heavenward, she was spiraling into emotional oblivion, driven by the angst from the incessant minor chords.

Sam and I once found a wonderful Mexican restaurant in the Northwest. Thrilled to finally be free of the sallow, tasteless "Mexican" foods of the Midwest, we ordered and fell to. Almost as soon as we started eating, we both noticed the music in the place: Carribean salsa. We found ourselves eating faster and faster, gulping and gasping, as the driving rhythm of the music pushed us to speedily eat our food. We loved that place, but the music was intolerable. We eventually found another Mexican establishment that suited our musical and culinary tastes better.

I personally detest band music. Yes, my father was a band conductor and we lived and breathed John Phillip Sousa's music for years. But those tweedling, squeaking clarinets, out of tune, and the volume of band music was just more than I could ever bear.

It's interesting how each of us can be so different. I honestly have tried to assimilate and to meld to Sam's preferences in many areas of life--when they don't offend me or threaten my own tastes. I now like the music of Acoustic Alchemy, and David Benoit--both types of music that would have given my father spasms. And Sam listens to the Brandenburg Concerti and Pavarotti.

As I write, the door to my study is closed. Coming from Sam's study is some kind of drums beating that precipitously gave way to Kiri Te Kanawa singing "Sheep May Safely Graze." My blood pressure begins to return to normal and my shoulders unclench. It's a good world after all.

Big in the head

Marvelous drawing, found here

My dear friend Olga, joined Sam and me for lunch yesterday. While I was finishing up with the salad and we were alone in the kitchen, she hurriedly told me that she thought she was dying. With tears and sighs, she recounted symptoms that proved that she was hanging by a thread: bad taste in her mouth, bloating and gas, a 22 pound weight loss in two months, grinding pain under the right part of her ribcage--it all added up to her imminent demise.

I don't mean to poke fun at Olga, because if those things were happening to me and I had no medical knowledge, I could think I was dying, too. The problem is that she has paid $300 in physician visit copayments in the last month, and is getting nowhere. Her doctor has told her that she is being hysterical, that it's all in her head, that it is gastritis, etc. When she told the doctor that many of her friends are physicians, he relented and ordered an ultrasound. "No gall bladder problems, see?" was his only comment after noting that there were no stones in her gall bladder. When Olga asks questions he acts as though he doesn't hear her. He doesn't respond to her comments and often, doesn't give her eye contact. He has in a word, grossly mismanaged her care, in addition to misrepresenting a noble profession.

I took out my 1977 medical-surgical nursing textbook and read to Olga all the symptoms of gall bladder disease. I recalled my rather straight-laced nursing teacher saying in a hushed voice, "Fat, forty and farty--the cardinal symptoms of gall bladder disease." We had cracked up to see Mrs. Reinbaum say farty.
"That's everything I have!" Olga exclaimed, after hearing the list of symptoms. "What's wrong with the doctor?" She has told him all of her symptoms, asked about various forms of treatment, and asked for a referral. She has even begun reading medical textbooks. As the problem has only increased in terms of pain, lack of appetite and bloating, she has gone back the doctor several times. She only gets responses grudgingly--nothing for pain, no anti-inflammatory, nothing for the "gastritis" she supposedly has, no concern. Since Olga is an immigrant, she is especially vulnerable to being taken advantage of. I won't stand for it.

Needless to say, I'm going with her to her next medical appointment. There is no excuse for what has happened to Olga. It is classic litigation material and I have no reservations about expressing this. This physician practices out of an HMO that has a reputation in the community for stringing patients along, taking money for needless tests, not providing good care to their patients. I anticipate a huge lawsuit one day that will shut down the entire enterprise.

The lesson I take from this is the realization that when we don't talk to other people and keep everything inside, the issues we hold close to us becomes "big in the head." That is, they take on lives of their own and become overwhelming. Since we don't have the opportunity to get a reality check from anyone else, we think the worse, assume that we are somehow to blame, and begin trotting out all of our weaknesses and propensities just that implicate us. As we circle the drain, so to speak, we recite our beliefs about the issue, our history, and all the facts because we can hardly believe what is happening. Nonetheless, we still go down the drain.

It is also at such times that people do rash things to try to relieve themselves of the angst they feel at carrying about such a story of doom and gloom in their head. People become suicidal, strike out in violence at other people, become hermits, tell someone off, begin planning their funeral service. Anything done to deal with a huge story in one's head will fail because it is no longer possible to think objectively or rationally about the facts. The response comes from the bigness of the problem, not the problem itself.

Children who grow up in abusive homes often have trouble with this. Shame keeps them from finding out from someone else how the rest of the world lives, how parents behave, and what is typical relational behavior. Instead, they develop sensitivities to anything that reminds them of the abuse. They may be people we consider "touchy" or they may be standoffish: they don't want people to think they're less than anyone else, or that they come from a dysfunctional background. Or they might become abusive themselves as a way to feel less vulnerable to being victimized again. Such people also don't know that what has happened to them doesn't necessarily mean that they're defined by it. They believe that the family issues that loom so large on their horizons--complete with all the pain and emotional blind spots--are visible to everyone else. But it is just the irrational, touchy, lashing out behavior that tells people something deeper is amiss.

Stories of where we come from can indeed become very big in our heads if we don't invite anyone else into our lives.

So Olga realizes today that she is not dying. She has epigastric pain, but she knows what it is now. The story in her head has gone from watermelon size to the size of a pea. I am revved up to take on her doctor. I imagine that she slept very well last night. I know that I did.

Concrete things

This is what my yard looked like after I went after it yesterday. For some of us who work with our heads for a living, and whose work does not always give immediate results, it is gratifying to do various types of physical labor. Because then one can see a product--something concrete and satisfying from one's labor. For me, that means cooking. It also means hacking and chopping tree branches.

Yesterday afternoon, I came home early and wanted to crash. But my grief had me feeling pent up inside. I needed something to work it out. Our rental property just happens to be covered with trees, bushes, and all manner of vines, and overgrown whatnot. The man who owns the property told us to have at it and do whatever we felt we wanted with it. So I had no end of branches to cut off. With a small handsaw I chopped down a 20 foot Hibiscus tree. The flowers were lovely, but the roots go under the foundation and the branches almost completely obscure a window at the side of the house. After that, I hit the tangerine tree with pruning scissors and saw. That tree has been full of old dry leaves in clumps, all through the branches. I went after it with a broomstick and knocked down dust and bits of twigs and leaves. It now looks like a half-way normal tree.

The dead peach tree went down with little fanfare. I started hacking at what used to be someone's Christmas tree. It had become half dead and had very snarly branches with lots of dry, dead pine needles. Fortunately for it, the blade on my saw gave out before I could chop it down. I'll save that for another day of horticultural Rambo frenzy. For now, the backyard is littered with heaps of dead branches, leaves, and logs.

I went to sleep last night around 9:00 p.m., completely exhausted.

I miss my father, and the knowledge that I can't call him tomorrow afternoon as I usually do, leaves me feeling empty. It seems that grief makes abstract, higher thought almost impossible. My head feels vacant, and I've been having a difficult time attending to very complicated tasks at work. This surprises me, because I have almost always felt invincible; that nothing could ever knock me sideways. But the death of my father has left a gaping hole in my heart and I marvel at the depth of my sadness.

Thankfully, life is full of all sorts of concrete tasks that I can accomplish. Today my office manager took a day off. I went after the office cupboards (that probably haven't been cleaned for four years). Three huge trash barrels later, and many amused guffaws from my students, the place was much cleaner and in order.

It is evening now, and I've cooked up some Moroccan Stew: eggplant, zucchini, currants, cinnamon, yams. Another concrete activity. It smells lovely.

Otis is on my lap as I write, occasionally batting at the cursor moving across the computer screen. I put a piece of scotch tape on his toes and his wild foot slinging to get rid of it makes me laugh hard. I still feel Sam's hugs from an earlier snuggle. Life goes on--just more slowly and thoughtfully. And I am grateful for all I have to enjoy.

Delicious!

Today I stayed home from work. My brain is in denial that anything significant has happened to me. My body tells a very different story. One could push me over with a feather. I was awake last night at 1:30 and couldn't go back to sleep. So I opted to stay home from work just to rest.

Something that has always been therapeutic for me is baking. I made the most wonderful persimmon chocolate chip cookies. You might want to try them:

In a blender, mix together 1 cup persimmon pulp with 1 tsp. baking soda. This breaks up the pulp and integrates the soda. It will turn into a congealed mass in a few minutes.

In a bowl, mix together 1 stick of butter (1/2 cup) or margarine; 1 cup brown sugar; 1 egg. Cream together until smooth. Add persimmon mixture and blend well. Add 2 cups all-purpose flour, 1/2 tsp. cinnamon; 1/4 tsp. ground nutmeg. Mix well. Add 1/2 cup chopped pecans or walnuts and 1 1/2 cups chocolate chips.

Drop from teaspoon onto greased cookie sheets and bake at 350 degrees for 10-12 minutes.

Next time when you'd like to make something special, try these. And have some free therapy in the baking of them!